Half-line Schrödinger operators with no bound states (Q557395)

The authors prove some deep results regarding the spectral theory of the half-line Schrödinger operator with Dirichlet boundary conditions at the origin. They consider the discrete operator \([h_V \psi](n) = \psi(n+1) + \psi(n-1) + V(n) \psi(n)\), \(n \in {\mathbb Z}^+ = \{1,2,3,\dots\}\), acting in \(l^2({\mathbb Z}^+)\), with \(\psi(0) = 0\), as well as the continuum case \([H_V \psi](x) = -\psi''(x) + V(x) \psi(x)\), \(x \in (0, \infty)\), acting in \(L^2(0, \infty)\), with \(\psi(0) = 0\) and \(V \in l^\infty(L^2)\), the Banach space of the uniformly locally square integrable functions (so that \(| | V | | = \sup_{n \in {\mathbb Z}^+} \sqrt{\int_{n-1}^n | V(x)| ^2 dx}\)). Two of the main results of the paper are: Theorem 1. If the spectrum \(\sigma(h_V)\) of \(h_V\) is contained in \([-2, 2]\), then \(\sigma(h_V)\) is purely absolutely continuous and \([-2, 2]\) is the essential support of \(\sigma(h_V)\), i.e., for every subset \(S\) of \([-2, 2]\) of positive Lebesgue measure, the spectral projection associated to \(S\) is nonzero. Theorem 2. If \(V \in l^\infty(L^2)\) and both \(\sigma(H_V)\) and \(\sigma(H_{-V})\) are contained in \([0, \infty]\), then both \(H_V\) and \(H_{-V}\) have purely absolutely continuous spectrum. Furthermore, \(\sigma(H_V) = \sigma(H_{-V}) = [0, \infty]\) and the essential support of these spectra is \([0, \infty]\). Both results are extended to the case where finitely many eigenvalues are present outside \([-2, 2]\) or \([0, \infty]\), respectively.